Covid-19 related health insurance claims have passed over ₹23,000 crores for non-life insurers, indicating the surge in cases, still, the average span of hospitalization and the claim amount has fallen in the second wave of the pandemic as compared to the last year's first wave.

According to the data with General Insurance Council (GIC), the insurers had received 15.32 lakh Covid-19 related claims by May 20, amounting to ₹23,715 crores, of which, 12.59 crore claims worth ₹12,133 crores have been settled. According to the data, around 1.13 lakh patients who had filed claims were still under treatment 22,461 had died, whereas the remaining 13.96 lakh patients have been discharged. Insurers said the average claim size is now lower at around ₹95,000 against the earlier ₹1,15,000 for patients hospitalized due to Covid-19. The duration of stay has also come down from the previous nine-day period to around six days. According to Bhaskar Nerurkar, Head, Health Claims, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance, the average claim size has slightly come down mainly because the duration of hospitalization has come down to about six days now from the earlier average of nine days, also the treatment protocols are standardized now. As the hospitals are also flooded with patients, they are sending them for home quarantine once they are not critical. According to an insurer, despite the huge number of cases, both hospitals and insurers are better prepared to deal with claims this year, and said timely clearance of claims is the main focus at present. Since the order by the IRDAI, all efforts are on to ensure that Covid-related hospitalization claims are cleared within one hour.

The GIC data moreover reported that amongst States, Maharashtra had the largest number of Covid-19 claims at 5.51 lakh, followed by Gujarat with 1.72 lakh, and Karnataka with 1.28 lakh claims. While 1.23 lakh claims have been filed from Tamil Nadu and above 85,000 claims have come from Delhi.